


There's No Other Way

by MagneticHummus



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Ambiguous Mention of Mindfang, Background Character Death, Gen, Hemospectrum, Light Angst, Rebellion, mild flirting if you squint maybe, or a different cerulean pirate
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-02
Updated: 2020-06-02
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:21:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,176
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24501514
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MagneticHummus/pseuds/MagneticHummus
Summary: For 7catsinatrenchcoat's prompt about The Dolorosa and Redglare.After a chance meeting, Dolorosa (Porrim) sees a spark of rebellion in Redglare (Latula). The neophyte legislacerator is hesitant to fully embrace revolutionary ideals, especially at the potential expense of her career and her life. Porrim, living her life in hiding, has her own ideas about Latula's career.
Collections: Ancestor Exchange 2020





	There's No Other Way

**Author's Note:**

  * For [7catsinatrenchcoat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/7catsinatrenchcoat/gifts).



> I'm sorry this ended up not being as shippy as was suggested in the prompt (or really at all...), I started thinking "how would they even have met?" and the premise got away from me a little bit. I had fun writing it though, and might expand it in the future!
> 
> Using their dancestor names seemed more natural to me than using their ancestor titles, but those are mentioned.

“Oh shit! Sorry, ma’am!” Redglare said, as the troll she’d accidentally crashed into helped her back to her feet.

“Not to worry,” she replied with a patient smile, handing her a file she’d dropped. “Just be careful next time, another troll might not be so understanding.”

She just nodded and apologized again, picking up her cane and the rest of her files as the other troll walked around her, a flash of jade peeking out from her layered black and grey skirts. The jadeblood shot her a parting smirk as Redglare straightened out her files and got back on her way through the market to the courthouse.

To her embarrassment, she was missing a file.

Her next time through the marketplace, she saw the jadeblood woman minding a fruit stall. Before she could say anything, the woman pulled the missing file from beneath the table. “So. You’re a junior legislacerator, huh?”

“I’ve just become a Neophyte,” she responded, reaching for the file. “Can I just have that back please? I’m going to be late.”

“Taking out dangerous petty thieves, Latula?” the woman teased, handing over the file.

“That’s not really any of your business! And don’t read through my files! And everyone calls me Redglare!”

“Mhm, I’m sure they do. I’m Porrim, by the way. Good luck with your dangerous criminal.”

Latula gave her an indignant look as she quickly checked over the file and headed to court.

She continued to run into Porrim at the market every evening on her way to court for months. She started buying fruit from her stall for breakfast, while Porrim teased her about her career and the low-level cases she’d been getting stuck with.

“You won’t be seeing me for a couple days, Porraceous” she said one day. “I’ve gotten my first field assignment!”

“Oh? What sort of hardened criminal are they letting you track down this time?”

She grinned. “Obviously I can’t let out too many details, but they’ve been on the lam for sweeps! It’s been incredibly difficult to trace him, but I finally found the most likely place he’s been hiding out, so I get to go find him! His days of evading the tax drone are numbered!”

“Oh no. Please be careful against such a dangerous criminal. How ever will I sell enough fruit to keep my stand running if something were to happen to you? Who will I have such engaging conversations with?”

“Don’t you worry! I’m the greatest legislacerator this court has ever seen, I’ll be there and back before the week is up!”

She shook her head. “Go get your incredibly dangerous criminal. I’ll still be here when you get back.”

She laughed. “You better be!”

One morning, after a particularly rough case, she passed the stall on her way home. “You look frazzled, Neophyte.” She was pleasantly surprised to see Porrim still minding the stall. “Rough day?”

Redglare puffed up her shoulders and put her hands on her hips. “Nothing I can’t handle!”

Porrim laughed. “I’m sure. The market’s closing up, and my hive’s nearby. Wanna come in for a container of scalding leaf fluid and talk about it?”

She paused and shifted on her feet a little. “Um...yeah! Yeah, totally!.”

“Great. Can you give me a hand with these covers? I need to put the fruit away.”

Her hive was small and out of the way, crammed into an alley with several other small hives, and though it looked rough and run-down from the outside, Porrim kept it clean and well-decorated on the inside. She started a well-kept old-fashioned crisprange, and put the kettle on. “So, Porrim,” she said, taking a seat on a meal block chair backwards and pointing her cane at her. “What’s your concern with my career path anyway? What business is it of a fruit vendor what a legislacerator is up to?”

She searched through a cabinet for a suitable container of tea. “You just don’t seem the type to be content just being a cog in the machine. Seems like you’d be happier doing something more with your life than running after tax evaders and petty thieves.”

Latula hit the tip of her cane on the floor. “It’s my duty, it’s important, and I’m awesome at it. I’ll be getting more high profile cases before I know it! Going after real criminals! What about you? You’re a jade aren’t you? What are you doing outside the brooding caverns and why did you trade that in for selling fruit of all things?”

Porrim sat at the table facing Latula, and set down the scalding leaf water. “Circumstances arose that made it impossible to continue to perform my duties.” Latula pulled a confused face at her. “I found a pitiable little wiggler while running an errand, who had somehow gotten out of the caverns before he pupated and faced the trials. A little mutant, who had no chance of finding a lusus, and would have been culled immediately had he been found by anyone else. But that’s another story for another time, we’re here because you’re having an issue at work.”

“I’m not having an issue! I-” She cut herself off and crossed her arms over the back of the chair, resting her head on them. “One of my coworkers accidentally found evidence one of the subjugglators was abusing his position- y’know, more than they’re allowed to- and actually tried to go ahead with the case. We tried to stop her, but…” She silently fiddled with the tag for a minute. “It doesn’t even bother me that much that they culled her in front of us as an example. I just can’t shake the feeling that she was right. And not just about that one subjugglator.”

She quickly clammed up, realizing what she was saying.

“It’s always easier to swallow when it’s all theoretical, isn’t it?” Porrim interjected. “When you’re in the caverns, the grubs are culled pretty indiscriminately. The trials really seem like a level playing field. They rarely let us go to the surface. They bury the lede of targeting lowbloods with talk of law and justice, and overload you with propaganda until you don’t even notice the highbloods getting away with everything. It’s not fair, it’s not justice, and to pretend otherwise is complicit at best.”

Latula’s eyes went wide and she started to respond before Porrim cut her off. “You think you’re the first wayward legislacerator I’ve come across? I know your type. You’re never going to make yourself come to terms with any of this. And you shouldn’t have to.”

“Why did you tell me all this? I could have you culled for it.”

Porrim picked up the mugs and brought them to the sink. “You don’t live as long as I have without being able to sniff out your allies.” She smiled. “And you’re one to talk. You seemed to trust me rather quickly.”

Latula blushed, then got up abruptly. “Oh, would you look at the time? I need to leave. Thanks for the scalding leaf water!”

“I’ll see you tomorrow at the stand.”

“Don’t be surprised if I come back with drones.”

“You think you’d need drones to take me in? I’m flattered.”

Latula rushed out of Porrim’s hive and back to her own. Porrim’s words echoed in her head. She would be well within her rights to make a case against her! She was a jade outside the caverns, she’d admitted to having contact with, and possibly harboring, a treasonous troll! But, somehow, she just couldn’t bring herself to do it.

She kept her head down through the next week. She avoided going past Porrim’s market stall under the guise of hunting down another case, and did her best to keep up an enthusiastic front at work while scrutinizing her colleagues. Maybe if she threw herself into her work, she could just ignore all these issues eventually. Forget what Porrim said. Avoid Porrim forever.

“Tell me the story,” Latula demanded when she finally brought herself to see Porrim again.

“I thought you were going to bring drones.”

“Don’t think I’m not still considering it, Porz. But I need to hear the story about the wiggler.”

Porrim sighed. “Alright. The market doesn’t close for another hour, meet me at my hive then.”

Latula headed back to her own hive in the meantime to drop off some files and let her lusus know she would be out late. She felt increasingly nervous on her way back to Porrim’s hive, but tried to shake it off.

Porrim already had two containers of tea ready on the table when Latula got there. She was wearing a silver necklace; Latula was sure she’d seen the chain under her blouse before, but didn’t think anything of it. The pendant was in the shape of a 6 and a 9, but sideways. They sat at the table, and Porrim told Latula the story of how she found a little mutant wiggler outside the caverns, and instead of culling it or leaving it to die, as she should have, she picked him up and raised him as her own, never to return to the brooding caverns. She told her about their life in effective exile, outside of troll society, how she really saw the extent of the injustice in the hemospectrum for the first time. How her ward, never fitting into any caste, took it upon himself to preach against it, and actually gained a following, and before long started an actual uprising.

And how he was killed for it. Captured, shackled, and tortured, and angry to the very end. How the disciple was spared, while Porrim and a few other followers managed to escape and go into hiding. The highbloods never bothered to learn her name, only knowing her as “The Dolorosa,” so it was easy to keep a low profile, as long as she didn’t draw attention to her blood color, and stayed out of the spotlight. She ended with a sigh. “I’ve spent so much time trying to convince myself that it’s more prudent to wait, and plan, gather more followers, that the movement needs me alive more than they need another martyr, but it just feels so much like I’m sitting idly by.”

Latula was silent for a minute, thoughtfully sipping her tea as she processed what Porrim had just told her. The nervous feeling resurfaced. She looked at Porrim. She was in way over her head. “I think I’m in way over my head.” She looked back down at her tea and took a breath, then looked back up at Porrim. “I’m in. I’m definitely in. But there’s so much to consider! I’m gonna need to think about what I’m gonna do.”

She bolted back to her hive, quickly thanking Porrim on her way out, and went through the case files she’d been assigned that she’d taken home to study. And she found her answer. Not quite a highblood being brought to justice, but a cerulean gamblignant. High enough to feel good about. It was by a stroke of pure luck that she’d gotten the case, usually gamblignants just had their property seized. The few who were taken in were usually handled by more experienced legislacerators. If she could successfully take a cerulean to task? This early in her career? It could start a pattern. Maybe eventually she’d be allowed to at least bring a highblood to trial. Pupa steps. She went to sleep marginally calmer and more confident.

Latula bounded through the market the next evening, stopping by Porrim’s stand. “You’ll never believe it, Po-Mary, I think I’ve got a solution to my whole issue!”

“Well that was a quick turnaround.”

“I’ll meet you at your hive later to discuss it, yeah? I’d love to stay and chat but I’ve gotta run!”

She spent her time in court researching and compiling information, and went straight to Porrim’s hive at the end of the evening.

“I’m gonna change the system from the inside!” Latula exclaimed the second Porrim shut the door. “I got an assignment to track down a cerulean- me! A neophyte! Obviously it’s not gonna happen overnight, but if I can make a habit of taking midblood cases, I might be able to eventually sneak in a blue blood or two, work my way up to at least getting a highblood in court!”

“I’m not gonna lie. That, objectively, sounds like a terrible idea. At best, you’ll still be working for a system upholding violent oppression. At worst, you’re going to get found out and culled.”

She unclasped her necklace, as Latula tried not to let her face fall. Her expression turned to confusion, however, when Porrim fastened the necklace around Latula’s neck. “But, I have to give you credit for trying to do something. And who knows? You might even succeed.”

Her face lit up again, and she high-fived Porrim. “Hell yeah I will!”

She walked into court the next evening with a renewed sense of purpose, and a thin silver chain peeking out from under her jacket.


End file.
